Container giant Maersk has significantly increased the capacity of its intra-Asian services. The Danish company is thus almost catching up with market leader Cosco in the region.
Over the last twelve months, Maersk, the number two in the world rankings after MSC, has significantly strengthened its presence in Asia. The intra-Asian liner network has grown by 100,000 TEU – more than a third – and now stands at 298,134 TEU, according to the industry service Alphaliner. The Chinese shipping company Cosco only has a narrow lead: the state-owned company has a capacity of 300,491. However, a further 200,000 TEU are attributed to the Chinese market alone.
Together with Maersk, partner Hapag-Lloyd has also grown in the region, with capacity increasing by 97% compared to August 2024. This is primarily thanks to the Gemini alliance between the two shipping companies, which is based on a “hub and spoke” concept and therefore ties up significantly more regional feeders in Asia. The average capacity of the ships is 2,981 TEU (Maersk) and 2,909 TEU (Hapag-Lloyd). Only MSC has the largest feeders in service with an average of 3,021 TEU.
The largest container shipping companies also account for by far the largest share in the intra-Asian region: 87% of freight in TEU is accounted for by the top 20, while the remaining tenth is shared between the 69 shipping companies active in the market. Year-on-year, the total volume increased by 13% and now stands at 2.4 million TEU.
In percentage terms, the Singapore-based shipping company Pacific International Line recorded the strongest growth of 116% and now has a capacity of 20,008 TEU. Evergreen and CMA CGM each added around 30,000 TEU to their fleets, a growth of around 18% each.
MSC achieved rather moderate growth of 1% year-on-year. With a capacity of 163,123 TEU, the global market leader in the Asian region remains in fifth place, closely followed by the Chinese shipping company SITC with 159,057 TEU. Alongside Maersk and Cosco, SITC is the only competitor with more than 100 ships in the region.
